I must say that yesterday did not start off at all well. I was awoken by Meg at about 5.30 and she was evidently in the throes of one her agitated moods. I immediately got up and made us both a cup of tea and then gave Meg a pill which a doctor had prescribed several months ago and which sometimes can help in circumstances like this. It seemed to have some affect but the effect wore off quite strongly so I looked in my reference book which is the BMA ‘New Guide to Medicines and Drugs’ to find the recommended dose. This quite definitive book indicated a dose of between 20-75mg but the tablets I had in sock were only 10mg. Upon this, I immediately gave Meg another pill and, very shortly afterwards, the two young carers for whom I have a great deal of time came along to get Meg up for the day. Whether it was the pills, or the beneficial psychological effects of the two young carers I cannot say but we got Meg turned around and then we had our normal breakfast. In passing, I must say that two young carers in combination either at the start or the end of the day seem to have a good effect upon Meg’s morale and mood – the exact mechanisms of what is going on here, I cannot really say. But I will say that this particular pairing of a male and a female carer (one aged 22,m the other 17) are not boyfriend and girlfriend but work very with each other and enjoy coming here as well, so I am grateful for small mercies. I did actually give the male carer some risotto last night as a little treat as I know he enjoys it but it his family are not in the habit of preparing this as part of their normal cuisine. After this, we went down the hill and met with our 90 year old chorister friend but the other who had the fall during the week did not turn up. We were informed that she had a bad stomach upset after the fall and had spent a night in hospital (so that was two hospital visits in three days for her) so I obtained her telephone number from our mutual friend and will text or phone her a little later for a bit of moral support.

Whilst I was preparing the lunch which was just bits and pieces of leftovers thrown together into a stir-fry we tuned into a YouTube presentation of Puccini arias. I think it was a Japanese soprano who was featured and there were certainly no problems with her voice. But I always think of the Japanese, apart from their Sumo wrestlers, as having quite a slim and petite phenotype but this is not what greeted our eyes.I came to he view that the singer might have had a Japanese mother but a Soviet 1950’s style tank for a father, so well built was she. I felt that if she had been giving an outdoor performance then when she took her final bows at the end of the performance, it wold probably have blotted out both the moon and the stars. But we had a real treat in store for us later on this afternoon as on BBC they were broadcasting both ‘Swallows and Amazons’ followed by ‘Emma’ (Jane Austen) which was my set book for GCE ‘O’-level in 1961. The ‘Swallows and Amazons’ was well cast but this modern production renamed the ‘Titty’ of the original to ‘Tatty’ for reasons of sensibility. I thought I recognised views of Catbells and Derwentwater as the film was shot in the Lake District. I was correct in my recollection as although most of the film was shot around Coniston water(the lake where Malcolm Campbell eventually died when attempting to break the world water speed record’), there were some scenes shot in Derwentwater. The production of Emma did not quite live up to the other versions I have this of this classic – Emma herself is made a little ‘doe eyed’ which rather belies the sharp tongue that she displays in various parts of the novel. Nonetheless, we generally enjoy the BBC productions of Jane Austen and there must have been many versions made over the decades, each with a slightly different ‘take’ on the story line. As a young teenager, I remember reading the first line (‘Emma Woodhouse was young, rich and beautiful and did not have a care in the world’ is a précis of this first line) and as a 15 year old reading this, I felt my lip almost curl in derision thinking I did not really wish to ready any further. Incidentally, I suspect that Austen might have nuances concerning the understanding of early nineteenth social class structure and social mores that are lost on 15 year olds but that is another matter. I seem to remember that my sister had to read Trollope for her GCE’s and the same comments apply. I must say, though, I thoroughly enjoyed the episodes of Trollope when they were broadcast on the BBC but sometimes these things go in cycles or fashions. The ‘Barchester Chronicles’, of course, were first broadcast more than forty years ago but perhaps someone might dust them off the shelves and give them a new airing.

There are fears throughout the globe as to whether Donald Trump will make good his pre-election promise to unilaterally impose tariffs from the rest of the World. Trump has said he wants to raise tariffs – taxes on imported products – on goods from around the world by 10%, rising to 60% on goods from China, as part of his plan to protect US industries. But there are fears in foreign capitals about what this could do to their economies. Goldman Sachs has downgraded its forecast for the UK’s economic growth next year from 1.6% to 1.4%, while EU officials are anticipating a reduction in exports to the US of €150bn (£125bn). At the same time, there are hopes that close allies and ‘friendly’ nations might be spared some of these tariffs and I suspect that British officials are working feverishly behind the scenes to try to alleviate the impact upon the UK economy. Of course if Trump cuts off the supply of military weapons to the Ukraine, then other European countries are going to have to make the terrible decisions either to supply weapons (which they can ill afford) or face a situation where the Ukraine cedes some of its territory to Russia in pursuit of a peace deal and we all wonder what target Putin will strike next as he seeks to re-establish the Russian empire of old.

Today, we started off a little later than usual because I knew that our usual start time was to be delayed by 20 minutes and, in addition, I had been asked if I could act as he ‘second carer’ to help Meg washed and dressed this morning. This went according to plan and it was the day for our domestic help to call around which always lifts our spirits. Last week I had made her a gift of a rather nice cotton bed throw/blanket which actually goes superbly well in a room that she was refurbishing and she delightedly showed me a photo of how well it looked. She had also brought along some particularly nice savoury biscuits to try later on. After we had breakfasted, we were delighted to get a phone call from our University of Birmingham friend so we popped down the hill and spent a really enjoyable three quarters of an hour in his company. After we got home at lunchtime, I got to work preparing a smoked mackerel risotto as not only was it going to provide a lunchtime meal for the two of us but I had also promised our two carers who are coming along later this evening small portion of it for them to enjoy at home. In the afternoon, as we often do on a Friday afternoon, we enjoyed the edition of ‘Question Time’ first broadcast yesterday evening and this helped to dispel some of the gloom of the afternoon which descends so early in these November days. I have often thought of November as a month that just has to be endured because apart from the bonfire night celebrations at the start of the month, there is nothing else much to which to look forward. December is in a different category because there is always Christmas at the end of the month and, of course, once 21st is out of the way then the nights are starting to get a little lighter by a smidgeon each day. The carers this afternoon brought along a letter asking us to detail our Christmas requirements but in the case of Meg and myself, it is just ‘business as normal’ The care agency tries to spread out the Christmas work so that the care staff can spend as much time as they can with their own families which is quite understandable. As a teenager, I often spent Christmas day with my family and then to work in the hotel from about 6.00 in the evening until 2.00pm the following morning. As we did not have a TV in those days, I did not feel as though I was missing much anyway.

The full extent of Donald Trump’s victory in the race to the White House only became evident to me yesterday when I read some of the analysis of the election results in ‘The Times’ Apparently, in the small hours of the day after the election, the CNN lead presenter asked their data analyst to show on a screen all 3,243 counties of the United States and those counties in which Kamala Harris had gained more votes than Jo Biden four years earlier. (A county in the United States is approximately 100,000 voters or approximately the size of two constituencies in the British parliamentary system) To the astonishment of the CNN presenter, not a single county could be found (from within the 3,243) where Kamala Harris attained more votes than Joe Biden four years earlier. The presenter gasped in disbelief – but this is a dramatic illustration of the victory that Trump attained. There are two more reflections which I think are salient. Kamala Harris campaigned very heavily on the issue of the rights to an abortion which was a sharp dividing line between the Democrats and the Republicans. But I looked up how many women aged 15-44 had actually had an abortion during the current year and the rate was 11.6 per thousand, or in rounded terms some 1.2%. So Kamala Harris was chasing the votes of 1.2% of the female population whilst the other 98.8% were worried about real ‘Bread and butter’ issues such as how to put enough food on the table in the face of rising inflation.In other words, the pursuit of an important issue but one which affected only a minute proportion of the population meant that the Democrats took their eye off the ball and did not pay sufficient attention to the economic worries of most of the population. This was compounded by Harris herself who in a critical interview was asked how her policies would differ from those of Joe Biden but all that she could reply was she would continue with the Biden programme which did not address the concerns of ordinary people. There are important lessons for all democratic parties of the left including of course the British Labour party. One wonders how many are concerned with the minutia of the trans rights debates compared with managing to improve one’s housing situation or to struggle on a low wage in an insecure job. So here, Trump ‘cut through’ as the analysts are wont to say, and did address the concerns of ordinary voters in a way that the Democrats did not. Some analysts are even suggesting that there is a complete realignment of American politics such that the Democrats are seen of the parties of the elites and of privilege whereas only the Republicans connect with struggling families.

So far this autumn, we have had a pretty mild spell as there is a very stable high pressure system which is locking in the clouds which, in turn, is preventing some of the early frosts that we have at this time of year. When I wheel Meg down in her wheelchair, I always make sure that she has a thickish cardigan on as well as a rain and wind proof jacket. But to complete her ensemble, I put on a Manchester University scarf and our very heavy ex- Russian military blanket across her knees which would actually protect her from a downfall of rain were we to have one.Then an extra blanket goes on top and we are ready to roll. I always ensure that I have High Visibility Vest on over my leather jacket because I think that it helps car drivers to think twice when there is some doubt who is going to cross the road first. In general, I have found car drivers to be very considerate and a majority always stop and let me cross the road although there is always the minority that speed away.

Yesterday was the day when the USA election results gradually unwound throughout the wee small hours of the morning. The previous evening, I snatched a few hours in bed and watched the early predicted results roll in and it was evident that the Republicans were going to have a good night. It was only when I got up in the morning that I fully appreciated the extent of the Trump victory and, of course, Pennsylvania was flipped from Democrat to Republican after which Kamala Harris was evidently doomed. There are several thoughts that have occurred to me as the morning progressed. All of the analysts were saying that this was going to be an incredibly tight election and the result would not be evident for some days until even Friday or Saturday. Instead we have a situation in which the Republicans not only control the Presidency but have also gained control of both Houses of Congress (House of Representatives and the Senate) as well as the Supreme Court stuffed full of Trump nominees. Thus we have an almost incredibly dangerous situation which the framers of the American constitution tried very hard to avoid that all of the major organs of government be under the control of one political party. So we have a situation where, in addition to Presidential power, anything he proposes will receive the endorsement of the two houses of Congress as well as the Supreme Court which means that there is nothing to stop the most extreme or illiberal of legislative measures passing into law with no prospect of opposing it or even amending it for the better. One factor which stood out from the post mortem analysis that has been conducted throughout the morning is that once again, as is now almost traditional, the Republican vote was underestimated by the pollsters. If you look at the series of opinion polls carried out throughout the last few months, Kamala Harris was always about 1.0-1.5 percentage point ahead of Trump but we now have is, in round terms, a 5% gap between the share of the popular vote that Harris was predicted to achieve and what Trump actually achieved. Now in very round terms, a 5% gap is enormous in an electorate of 160 million and represent some 8 million Americans across the country who voted for Trump but who the pollsters did not identify. This means that across the 50 states of the USA, there were in each state some 160,000 Trump voters whom the pollsters did not identify but nonetheless ‘came out of the woodwork’ and gave Trump victory. Incidentally, the same sort of phenomenon is identified in the UK as ‘shy conservatives’ i.e. a tranche of people who never reveal their voting intentions to the pollsters but who nonetheless seem to emerge and to vote for right wing parties.There is also another very telling demographic statistic in that the Trump appeal extended as far as the Latino and black male populations in a way that the Democrats could not understand, let alone predict. In other words, the Democrats took the latino and black vote for granted and this cost them dear when they actually voted for Trump. The problem is that the Democrats thought of the latinos as a block whereas the older immigrant communities who had worked their way up and into American society may well have wanted to differentiate themselves from the recent arrivals from Latin America and not necessarily identify with them. Again, we have seen the same sort of ‘overlooking’ in the UK electorate where Boris Johnson exploited the fact that the white, male sections of society, not college educated were taken for granted by the Labour Party whereas Boris Johnson (in his time) and Nigel Farage manage to sweep into right wing voting. So now we have a president of the United States who is the oldest ever elected, a convicted felon and only person since the nineteenth century to be re-elected having once lost power. The world economy may look on with some trepidation as Trump has vowed to reintroduce tariffs which will usher in a period of isolationism and protectionism. We also have a whole series of legal judgements that have gone against Trump who is now in a position to pardon himself or to sweep away all legal actions against him. A lot of the post election analysis has also concentrated upon the fact that, in the end, it was not the abortion issue but the economy that held most sway with voters. After the pandemic, many voters did not feel that the economy had delivered for them and felt that inflation had hit hard in the past and was continuing to do so. Also I discerned from several ‘vox pop’ interviews that Trump had implanted the idea very successfully that he was a very successful businessman and there, by extension, knew better than Harris how a modern economy works. Anybody who has followed the Trump biography know this to be very wide of the mark but it is the perception rather than the reality, that hits home. I conclude after this soul searching that Republican voters are inclined to overlook all of Trump’s evident faults and to forgive his transgressions whereas Democrat voters did not have the same feelings towards their candidate who will soon, one presumes, disappear from the public view.

This morning, after we had absorbed some of the news of the election, Meg and I made a quick trip down to Waitrose to pick up a copy of our newspaper. There we did receive the good news that our friend who had fallen and cut her head in the toilet of the store would be returning this afternoon to pick up her mobility scooter which had been kept safe for her overnight. This was good news for us but we also learnt that she had lain on the toilet floor for a whole two and a half hours before the ambulance actually arrived. For lunch, I tried an experimental dinner which one of our carers said she prepared for her children and they loved it. It involved heating up some mackerel fillets in the oven and then serving them on a bed of egg fried rice which she prepared herself. I was not quite sure how to do this but I fried an onion, scrambled the egg into it and then adding rice to the mixture. I used Arborio rice but perhaps I should have used a long grain white rice instead. But the results were pretty pleasing as well as tasty so perhaps I shall refine my technique and cook this dinner again.

Now that election day in the USA is actually here, many commentators re turning to the notion of process i.e. how the results are to be counted and when the results might be available. Tight presidential elections are not unknown, the closest recently being in 2000 when Al Gore conceded (perhaps wrongly) the state of Florida to the Republicans. There has been inquest after inquest into this election with many commentators conceding that Bush actually won but probably more voters wanted Gore to win but were faced with confusing ballot forms and wrongly cast their vote for a candidate called Buchanan. Above all, USA Today highlighted that its review revealed, ‘The American system of elections routinely fails to count hundreds of thousands of ballots because of errors by voters, confusing ballot instructions, poorly designed ballots, flawed voting and counting machines and the failure of election workers to adequately help voters.’ and this seems to have been the case here. I have heard two legal experts on USA election law giving their opinion in the last day. One was saying that in his view given the accuracy of modern voting machines, the amount of error in the system is incredibly small at least compared with any alternatives. So Trump challenging the result in 2020 was probably challenging the most secure part of the system. Another expert was of the view that we would not get anything like a result until Friday or Saturday. The Americans have a system of ‘calling’ a state when the lead of the winning candidate exceeds the number of ballots still be counted and therefore, mathematically, the candidate in the lead cannot now lose. But this ‘calling’ process is likely to be much delayed this time around as the results are so tight and no doubt there will be legal challenges and demands for a recount all over the place.

This morning tended to be a little dramatic but not in the way that we would have liked. But on our way down to Waitrose I experimented with having my iPhone playing Mozart tracks from the recently migrated App and this as we entered the store we had ‘Meg, Mike, Mobility and Mozart’ But as we were ordering our coffee we were informed that one of our friends (the one who uses a mobility scooter and elbow crutches) had sustained a fall within the store’s customer toilet. In falling, she had banged her head but how badly I do not know but certainly cut her face and it was bleeding into her eye. The Waitrose partners were absolutely magnificent and administered literally ‘first aid’ by putting on dressings onto the wounds on her face and tried their best to make her comfortable. But of course, they had to follow protocols and neither move her or give her a soothing hot drink. Two staff at least administered to her and then a third member of staff who was first aid trained stayed by her side. Our friend had managed to telephone the ambulance herself and give whatever details and I said to myself that when the ambulance men arrived I would have a word with them and make sure that full reports were submitted to her doctor and, more particularly the social services because our friend is now certainly at risk and probably needs more support. Ambulance after ambulance seemed to flash by with their sirens blaring but after an hour and a quarter none had come to the assistance of our friend who was probably destined to spent even more time on a cold toilet floor. But the Waitrose staff found some blankets and were generally excellent. I thanked them copiously on our friend’s behalf but, I suspect that like myself as we are their oldest customers and we are such frequent customers that they had pulled all of the stops out. One of the male staff who I know well even got onto her mobility scooter, never having driven one before, and managed to get it to a parking space at the back of the store where it would be both safe and secure. On my way up the hill I suddenly did not feel too well on the steepest section at the start of the walk home and wondered if I had a bit of delayed shock or just low blood sugar level but we got home and coped with a little wobbly that Meg was experiencing the minute I got into the house. Fortunately, a carer arrived not long afterwards whilst I got Meg warm with a cup of hot, sweet tea and a blanket. Things were running a little late today what with one thing or another so I cheated and made a ‘quickie’ lunch which was a tin of chicken in a white wine sauce, added to a tin of chunky chicken and vegetable soup, both enhanced with some petit pois and served on the type of microwaveable rice that is ready in 2-3 minutes. After this and later in the afternoon, we treated ourselves to the third episode of ‘Tess of the D’Urbervilles which was as well acted and gripping as ever and helped the afternoon to whizz by. Naturally, the media is full of the news, such as there is, of America at the polls but I think that the earliest possible result will not be announced until about 1.00am GMT as we are five hours ahead of the USA. The American polls do tend to close a little bit earlier but, of course, it varies state by state and to British eyes, this all adds up to a very complicated and confusing picture. Equally confusing is the way that many states announce partial results congressional district by congressional district. So it might appear that one party is establishing a lead and the results are announced from an opposing congressional district and the provisional results seems to have been reversed.

November 5th is, of course, the traditional bonfire night. But although we have heard some of the whoosh and bangs of fireworks, we also heard some last weekend when families felt, no doubt, they had a bit more time at weekends. I also expect that some will even delay until next weekend, as well. So we now have a scenario in which the traditional bonfire night extends over a period of several days. As a marketing gimmick, no doubt, the ClassicFM radio station is advertising everyone a ‘calm and soothing music for pets’ service but I wonder if they end up with a multitude of satisfied or dissatisfied listeners?

Yesterday did not start off too well as Meg had a rather disturbed night with two periods of extreme anxiety exhibited, one at about midnight and the other about 5.00am. But by the time the couple of carers arrived, Meg was somewhat calmer and she is always so much better once we have got her washed, dressed and in her wheelchair. Having said this, one of the carers was pretty new and inexperienced so I lent a hand on the occasions it was necessary. We knew that there were things going on today which would mean that our current routines would have to be modified and the most important of these was a visit by a physiotherapist (specialising in equipment) accompanied by a trainee. The physio evidently had to be given a brief history of Meg’s condition and we manage each day and was quickly appraised of the situation. He unequivocally recommended a special ‘Riser-Recliner’ type of chair and was going to get in touch with the representative of the firm straight away that afternoon. We should expect to wait for about three weeks to get a more specialised call by somebody from the supplying firm as well as the physio himself and as soon as they have assessed what kind of chair Meg needs to fit her needs, the ordering process can go ahead. If we are fortunate, I feel that we may be able to be supplied with this more specialised chair by Christmas. As soon as the physio and his trainee had left, we immediately got Meg prepared for a walk into town as we reckoned we had a window of opportunity of about an hour and a half open to us. So we popped down the hill, picked up our the copy of our daily newspaper and finally made our way to the Post Office. Here I handed over the TV unit that EE had supplied for us and which was superfluous to our needs and, naturally, I am ensuring that I hang onto the receipt of postage for dear life as I shall be charged for the unit if it is not returned within a certain time period. I had already been supplied with a pre-paid plastic bag to return the unit but evidently a trip to the Post Office was called for. On our way down the hill, I bumped into our Irish friend but we could not stop for a chat as I explained that I needed to get up and down relatively quickly. When we returned home, we got the care agency manager himself (he often puts himself on a shift when staff shortages threaten) who had evidently put himself on duty as he needed to give additional bits of training to the second care assistant accompanying him. After this, it was time to cook ourselves a beef dinner, rather late in the day but still very tasty. Meg and I were particularly looking forward to the second episode of ‘Tess of the D’Urbervilles’ which did not disappoint – this particular production by the BBC gave an excellent portrayal of rural life (in Dorset?) in the early nineteenth century and the quality of the acting, as well as the story lines, were compelling. There was one scene in it which reminded me of an incident from my own past. The novel (and the film) contains an episode when Angel (the male hero) meets the four milkmaids from the farm where he worked and carries each of them individually across a flooded path when they were on their way to the Sunday morning service. Each of the milkmaids (and of course Tess herself) were completely enamoured of Angel and almost swooned at the prospect of being carried across the flooded path by him. When it was announced that Angel and Tess intended to marry, her three milkmaid companion burst into tears because the man of their dreams was suddenly as they say, ‘spoken for’. Now the incident from my own occupational life mirrors this in a way. As a young 15-year old, I was supervised by a young manager at the Old Swan Hotel in Harrogate by a young but exceptionally handsome young manager who I shall call ‘Lionel’. Now all of the young waitresses yearned to catch the eye of ‘Lionel’ although he was way beyond their socioeconomic standing and experience and so the prospect of an engagement were slight in the extreme. However, I was present with a group of these waitresses when it was announced that ‘Lionel’ had in just in fact got engaged to a person in his social circle and, being present when the news was broken to them, I witnessed several of them openly burst into tears. If this sound incredibly quaint, it did in fact happen that way. To compound matters, Lionel was removed from their midst whilst his well-heeled family sent him on a gastronomic tour of Europe. He was such a talented young man ( and an exceptionally good manager to boot) that I suspect that he was being groomed for managerial experience in one of the elite London hotels such as the Dorchester.

Yesterday, was of course, the last full day of campaigning in the US presidential election. Up to one half of the electorate have already voted (some 75 million) and so their votes are ‘locked in’ and not susceptible to change. So although there may be last minute gaffes (or more likely insults) flying around, it may be that it is too late for these to have real impact upon the outcome of the election. Much more sinister is the army of lawyers assembled by Trump (and perhaps matched by the Democrats, although I doubt it) who are standing posed to sniff out the slightest opportunity for a legal challenge as the polling results emerge in the hope of snatching some advantage in what has been labelled as probably the most closely fought election in American electoral history. In their appearances on Monday, both candidates will be shadowed by final polls that suggest the race is even. The final New York Times/Siena College poll of Pennsylvania, published on Sunday, found it tied, with both candidates garnering support from 48 percent of likely voters. So this particular key state may well be in the hands of a thousand voters. However, the latest news appears to be that Trump has been slowly gaining support in the State and chipping away at the small lead enjoyed by Harris to date so I would not be surprised if this absolutely critical state (and probably, but not invariably, the whole election) does swing Trump’s way.

Yesterday certainly did not get off to the best of starts as the care workers were unaccountably delayed for about 25 minutes and one of the care workers was my least favourite. In addition, Meg was going through an agitated period so getting Meg both washed and dressed was somewhat problematic. However, once we had actually Meg sitting in her wheelchair she was in a calmer frame of mind and some porridge helped to restore her equilibrium. Immediately after breakfast and the Lorna Kuenssberg Politics programme, I had a bit of a brainwave and managed to locate very quickly a little external, portable Bluetooth speaker. This was a bit of kit developed by a small British technology firm but it is brilliantly simple. It worked first time when I tried it out on my iPhone4 but then I went on the web to find and print off a manual to make sure I was utilising it to the full. The most important fact I managed to discern is that a single charge through a USB style port may last as long as ten hours which is probably more than the phone. The manual told me to turn on my device first and the kit called a ‘Droid’ second and then the ‘intelligent’ Bluetooth connects automatically. This means that I can my iPhone complete with at least 300 classical tracks of music and play it wherever I want. It goes by the name of a ‘Droid’ and looks somewhat like a miniaturised Dalek in appearance, the name evidently derived from ‘Android’ An android is a humanoid robot or other artificial being often made from a flesh-like material. Historically, androids existed only in the domain of science fiction and were frequently seen in film and television, but advances in robot technology have allowed the design of functional and realistic humanoid robots. Then, pushing my luck a little, I realised that I could utilise this little system with me on the wheelchair when Meg and I make our daily excursion. So I kitted myself out with the iPhone4 in the little compartmentalised bag which always accompanies us whilst the ‘Droid’ itself I put into a spare bottle bag that I found and hung on the other handlebar about a foot away from Meg’s ear. This worked for half the journey down the hill and then suddenly stopped. What I think happened is that after the charge on the iPhone4 dipped below 20%, the system automatically enters a low power mode and playing music tracks is jettisoned. But after I got home, I recharged the phone and everything is now working the way that it should. On our way down the hill, we bumped into our Italian friend and were very, very sad to learn to know that she is probably going to sell up and relocate herself much nearer to her daughter in the Cotswolds, which I am sure is a very sensible decisions for her as she gets older but a little disappointing for us.

Yesterday afternoon, we had the treat of watching ‘Paddington 2’ which I always enjoy, even though I have seen it several times before. Towards the end of it, though, I did my usual trick f falling asleep with a cup of tea in my hand. However, all was not as bad as might be feared as I had only a small cup with not much left in it and then most of it on my trousers (which then went straight into the wash), some on the newspapers spread out on the floor before me and only a smidgeon on the carpet which was quite quickly cleared up. After the film was over, there was a news bulletin on with some extraordinary scenes. One of the news items was reporting on a visit of the (Spanish) King and Queen of Spain to the stricken area of Valencia after the recent floods in which a year’s annual rainfall fell within 12 hours. In particular, they visited a small town near to Valencia where no official aid seemed to be forthcoming for five whole days. There are gruesome reports that have started to circulate that although the death toll now exceeds 200, the authorities are approaching the task of pumping the water out from some underground car parks in which they may be dozens of cars with goodness knows what number of dead bodies trapped within them. The population are experiencing a simmering anger because they feel utterly abandoned by the authorities, both national, regional and local. In particular, the army has been deployed very late and then only with very limited numbers. The media has shown a lot of reports of volunteers rushing to help with the clear up operations with, almost literally, mountains of mud to remove. But the anger of the population boiled over when the King and Queen of Spain paid a visit and attempted a walk about to give comfort to the local population and they were pelted with ‘snowballs’ of mud of which there was a lot around. The Queen was shown wiping mud from her face and the King my well have been a successful target as well. Eventually, a huddle had to be formed around the royal couple so that they could be shepherded to safety. Such scenes are absolutely unprecedented, of course, and I intend to email our Spanish friends to offer condolences and to get some more inside accounts.

Yesterday was the second last full day of campaigning in the US presidential election. Trump’s advisers are desperately trying to keep him ‘on message’ whereas Trump himself is already crying ‘Foul! Election Fraud!’ in Pennsylvania before a single vote has been counted. Even at the last moment, there has been a surprise poll in Iowa, normally firmly in the Republican camp which puts Harris 1% ahead according to a small but respected pollster. Meanwhile in North Carolina, the Trump camp is getting worried that the state might be on a knife edge although, like Iowa, it should be one that Trump would be expected to take. Sky News is promoting its election news broadcasts starting at 10.00pm on Tuesday but I suspect that the really important results will not actually come through until Wednesday so I am not going to stay up beyond an hour or so to see which way the wind is blowing. Some commentators are trying to warn us that it could be several days before the result emerges in an election as finely balanced as this well and then, of course, literally armies (or at least several thousands) of lawyers are going to swing into place to claim irregularities.

Yesterday, I had spent more time than was good for me in the middle of the night getting some of my Bluetooth interfaces to work with current and backup version of my mobile phones. This process was a little fiddly and at times frustrating but I managed to succeed with some but not all of my various interfaces. Meg and I were not very happy that our day was due to start 40 minutes early as the scheduled getting up call was 7.20 rather than 8.00am. I do not think that either carers or their charges like this very early slot in the morning but we have to make the best of it. Meg was not too sleepy this morning so we managed to get her into her wheelchair without much ado. This has now been adapted recently since the wheelchair specialists made some running adjustments to it for us the other day. We now have some professional ankle straps fitted and we also have a curved backrest inserted into the chair which helps to keep Meg stable. Also, the wheelchair specialists supplied a special little triangular wedge which they call a ‘lateral support’ and this helps to keep Meg in a fairly upright position in the chair. After we had breakfasted, it was time for us to make our Saturday morning trip to Waitrose and there we took coffee with the lady that we know well but she drives a special scooter and then manages to get from this into the store with the help of a couple of elbow crutches. Our friend is fiercely independent which does impress me greatly but she knows that her condition is only going to deteriorate with age but we have to do what we can to put off the evil day. We spent some time discussing the forthcoming US elections as well as some domestic issues until the time came for us to leave. In some ways this was a sad little occasion because I let my friend get to her feet unaided but today her legs just would not work as she wanted them to. I offered her one of arms by way of support and my friend did accept it in the spirit in which it was offered but I noticed that some tears of frustration had crept into her eyes. Both she and I do realise that however well meant, the more she accepts these little offers of support so her independence has just diminished a tad. I think both she and I are of the view with various bodily movements and motions then one has to either ‘use it or lose it’ and our friends is fighting as hard as she can to do whatever she can for herself. We will meet again next Tuesday all being well, by which time the actual voting in the American elections will be taking place. We walked back up the hill but when we got to the house, coinciding with the two carers, Meg was having a little agitated spell. I must say that one of the carers was excellent in helping to keep Meg on an even keel and I did my little bit in preparing some chicken soup which also helped to calm Meg down as well as some anti-histamine which one doctor prescribed months ago to help in circumstances such as this. We dined on the second half of a quiche with carrot and swede mash and some fine green beans. After all of this, we settled down to watch the biography of Vera Brittain in ‘Testament of Youth’ which we first saw some years ago but the film is always worth an extra viewing. The film is as powerful a depiction of the horrors of WWI that has been portrayed and is exceptionally poignant in places where Vera Brittain loses first a fiancee and then actually nurses her own badly wounded brother. Vera Brittain was the mother of Shirley Williams who was a Labour MP for years before with three other colleagues they split off to form the so-called ‘Gang of Four’ (the SDP) in the 1980’s. When the war has ended, Vera resumes her studies in Oxford where she meets with another undergraduate by the name of Winifred Holtby. It is at this point that I have some personal connection, albeit slight, with the film. Winifred Holtby was the author of ‘South Riding’ and was probably resident in Hull or thereabouts. My mother who had lived in Hull used to speak of Winifred Holtby and I wondered if they moved in similar circles or even knew each other, as my mother had done some acting with the Hull Repertory company (or it could have been just an amateur dramatic society and my memory is very hazy on this point). I imagine the BBC is putting on the film at this point because we are getting into the run up to Remembrance Sunday in one week’s time. We viewed most of the film but Meg started to experience a period of agitation towards the end of it and in any case the carers were coming for their tea time call so we had to end our viewing somewhat prematurely. I gave Meg a special anti-histamine type pill one of the doctors had prescribed some ago and a combination of this, a cup of tea, some chocolate and the warm glow of the electric fire helped her to calm her down a little. Then we looked at some of the ‘Yes, Prime Minister’ series that YouTube offers up to us at this time the afternoon.

As widely predicted, Kemi Badenoch was elected as Leader of the Conservative party today. In total, about 132,000 members of the Conservative Party were eligible to vote in the leadership election – a noticeable fall from the 172,000 in the contest in 2022 which Liz Truss won. The turnout was also down – 72.8% in 2024 vs 82.2% in 2022 – with about 40,000 members not voting. But this is rather a historic moment as Kemi Badenoch s the first female black leader of a major political party. Being already on the right wing of the Tory party, it will be quite a job to unify the party which has always been in a fractious mood with the debates on Europe and Brexit tearing the party apart. But the Labour Party is not governing in a very sure footed way and amazing though it might appear, the Tory party is actually one point ahead at this point. But being the leader of the Opposition and with no prospect of returning to power for at least five years and probably for ten years, the task of the leader of the Opposition is not going to be easy. She has stated that each contender for the leadership would be offered a place in the Shadow Cabinet but several ‘heavy hitters’ such as James Cleverley and Jeremy Hunt are returning to the back benches so there may be a return of Priti Patel to the Shadow Cabinet. If it were not for the American election results unwinding next Wednesday, then the next PMQ might have been worth a viewing.

Last night before I got to bed I had some extraordinary good luck. In my very ancient (c. 2010) iPhone4, I had inserted a SIM that cost me practically nothing and then put £5 worth of credit to use as a PAYG phone. On the phone I had a classical music app which I do not think I had ever fully used before. To cut a long story short, I downloaded 202 tracks of classical music representing some 55 composers and 48 of them being Mozart (who happens to be one of my favourite composers) When I say the tracks are downloaded, I am pretty sure that they are being stored within the app itself rather than being added to the ‘Music’ file which Apple maintains in its iPhones. I had a quick word with the more tech savvy of the care workers who thought that Spotify worked like this as they could download tracks which could then play even when not internet connected so it looks as though my hunch was correct. But there is a huge bonus as I can interface the iPhone4 through a Bluetooth connection which means that the tracks can play through a loudspeaker system. In our Music Lounge I have a CD player with speakers that are adequate enough and so much bigger than the speakers found on a phone and, similarly, I can interlace the iPhone through the Panasonic micro HiFi system that I have installed in the kitchen. So all of this means that I can enjoy music that I really enjoy in at least two locations within the house. All of this was discovered in the middle of the night, as it were, as it took some time to download the tracks and then to test them out so my sleep pattern was a little interrupted, but I went to bed very happy at long last. In the morning, we knew that we were going to be quite busy as Friday is the day when our domestic help calls around. After our normal exchange of news, we awaited the arrival of the Eucharistic minister from our local church who we have not seen for a couple of weeks now. We had both learnt of the news of the death in the last day or so of the parish priest who was the immediate predecessor of our current parish priest. We knew that he had been ill with bowel cancer (about one year later than myself) and after his enforced retirement through ill health actually went to visit him on one occasion because the retirement home where he was lodged was quite near to the village in which Meg used to live in Staffordshire. Our son also called around who it was delightful to see after he had spent a few days away visiting in laws as it was half term and now that half term is over, we will see more of him next week. We spent some time discussing the Budget and the way it had been received in the country as a whole. The reactions of the market to the budget is interesting as, once again, the government in its borrowing plans is at the mercy of ‘the kindness of strangers’ which is one expression used when the government is financing its borrowing through the issue of gilts which may, or may not, be attractive to the investing community as a whole and hence ‘the kindness of strangers’. We got an invitation to meet for coffee in Waitrose with our University of Birmingham friend but as our visitor from church had been delayed by about 20 minutes we had to proceed down the hill in a tremendous rush and only had about a quarter of an hour to spend with our friend. Then it was a case of a massive dash up the hill to be home in time for the carers but we made it with about a minute to spare. The carers were two young people who we know pretty well and so the three of us put into action a plan to help Meg sit in her chair in such a way that her knees are not as bent as they would have been when sitting in the wheelchair. I had found a way to raise the front of Meg’s chair by a few inches which meant that when Meg was sitting in it securely she was not at all likely to tip out of it. This little experiment seemed to work quite well but we needed to support Meg with a cushion or so to keep her secure. This was particularly important today as the vagaries of the care agency rota meant that Meg was having to spend five hours in her armchair which we knew really was too long a stretch but there was nothing else we could do under the circumstances. However, the young carers and myself have put our heads together and have devised a little system whereby Meg’s knees are not bent to anything like the same extent and, judging by the fact that when she was put to bed she could straighten out her legs more than before, our little system seems to be having a degree of success.

After we had lunched on a haddock fish pie, Meg set ourselves for a good afternoon of TV viewing. Firstly, we watched Question Time broadcast the evening before and when this was completed started to treat ourselves to the first episode of ‘Tess of the D’Urbervilles’ by Thomas Hardy. This was a classic BBC production with superb cinematography filmed in Thomas Hardy country (Dorset) and with an extremely good cast. There are four episodes with each one lasting an hour so naturally each of the critical scenes in the novel receives the attention that it deserves. This afternoon, I eventually managed to speak with someone at EE so that they could link my debit card with my newly installed SIM to facilitate top-ups. The official advice is ‘download our App’ but the trouble is that the operating system is so old on the iPhone 4 that it cannot be updated and therefore the EE App will not install. But now I have successfully linked the debit card, topping up becomes incredibly easy because you put in a couple of code letters, then the last four digits of your pre-validated debit card and then the amount you want to top up in whole £s. So the whole transaction can be performed by sending a simple text message of just 9 digits including spaces and you get a confirmatory text within a few seconds once the transaction has gone through.

Yesterday was a day out of the ordinary, as it turned out. The day had actually started in the middle of the night when I woke up and realised that as it was practically the end of the month, I had scheduled myself to put a little bit of credit on the old iPhones into which I have inserted PAYG SIMS and which gives me a ‘de facto’ backup iPhone for if and when the occasion demands. All of this worked more or less as I wanted it to but in the course of looking some of my records, I saw that on Meg’s phone there was a message indicating that she needed to update her NHS app or lose it altogether. I had previously made some efforts to get Meg’s NHS app fully functional but had been thwarted as I had forgotten the email address that we had used to set up the system and had a horrible feeling it was an out of date email to which we no longer had access. But the fact that the NHS had used Meg’s email address to contact her as a reminder was like manna sent from heaven and although I had forgotten the password, this was fairly quickly regenerated and good notes made as to what they both are. But there seems to be quite a complex procedure which is probably an enhancement to security in the latest version of the NHS app because the system is now demanding a photographic ID which had to be located on my main computer system and then transmitted to Meg’s iPhone. At least we now have an almost working NHS app on Meg’s iPhone but there is a crucial last step when the system is probably going to take a photo of Meg’s face and use AI software to reconcile the image just taken with the image on the passport. I suppose this is a good security procedure and once it is in place, I am sure it might be very useful not least in getting appointments and ordering new medicines but we are not quite there yet. This morning was the day allocated to do my shopping and I was delighted that the young ‘A’-level student, studying Psychology had been allocated to be Meg’s ‘sit’ for the morning. I scoured my bookcase to see if there were any psychology books that might be more useful to her rather than sitting on my bookshelves. I managed to find three Psychology type books, as well as a simple statistics for psychologists primer, a good study guide and a little book on report writing. I am delighted that these books are going to go to a good home and I hope they help her achieve good grades and help her in a subsequent career. Altogether, this young carer spent three sessions with us today (a getting Meg up call, a ‘sit’ session and then doubling up to provide the lunchtime call). We had a lunch of curry which is really just bits and pieces thrown together and served with rice but we had barely finished this when the wheelchair specialists called around. We knew that they were scheduled to come some time between 1.00 and 5.00 but in the event turned up when we were just on the point of finishing our meal. The wheelchair specialist fitted some special ankle straps so that Meg’s legs can be correctly aligned with the wheelchair frame but at the same time they provided a specialist ‘lateral support’ which is a triangular piece of kit that fits into the wheelchair in such a way that Meg does not slope sideways (as, without any upper body strength, she is prone to do)

After the wheelchair specialists had made their adjustments and then departed, we received a telephone call from a physiotherapist who was telephoning to make an appointment to see Meg. Some OTs/physiotherapists had previously called me and I had briefed them about Meg’s legs which I was concerned about getting ‘locked’ into a particular position after she had been sitting in the same position for most of the day. They had said that we were ‘in the system’ and we should expect a visit in a few weeks time – however, there might have been ‘wheels working with wheels’ because I was delighted that they could come and pay us a visit next Monday. They mentioned a ramp as a household adaptation which was something I had requested months ago in order to get Meg out of the French windows at the back of the house but is probably something we no longer need as the summer is effectively over and the days are gone when we can enjoy summer sunshine in the back garden. To my considerable surprise, though, the physio mentioned a more specialist chair, specifically a ‘Riser-Recliner’ type of chair which I thought had been ordered by another OT weeks and weeks ago. I had been waiting patiently only to be informed a few days ago that the OTs were progressing items ordered last April and it is now practically November but we entered this system last June so had been told to wait for at least another couple of months. This piece of equipment is moving from the ‘nice to have’ to he ‘completely essential’ in my view, for the following reason. As a result of not standing or walking, Meg is losing all body strength and in particular ‘core’ strength. This means that even when sitting in a chair she is apt to slip sideways and even gradually slip off the chair altogether unless special precautions are taken. In the chair in which she is seated after the carers’ teatime call, we have the chair at an angle, then make sure that she has a special triangular pillow behind her augmented by a little cushion designed to stop sideways movement and finally a small platform covered by a blanket so that her feet are just at the right height and hopefully she will not slip too far, or at all. The young carers are particularly good at getting Meg into just the right orientation but we are getting to the stage where a lot of these little aids and supports will not work as Meg loses more and more core strength.

This afternoon, we started to view a film first broadcast or repeated) on BBC4 the previous evening on the life of Thomas Hardy through his own poetry. Meg and I were looking forward to this but the whole programme a little wistful and did not quite live up to its promise. But also broadcast last night was he whole of ‘Tess of the D’Urbervilles’ in a series of four parts. So we should be able to watch this at the rate of one episode a day for the next four afternoons which should be quite a treat for us. I try to note what the good evening programmes are as they are broadcast day by day and then get them on catchup the following day.